Citizens in Space to Present at American Geophysical Union

Published 9:55 AM ET Sun, 11 Nov 2012
PR Newswire

SAN FRANCISCO, Oct. 2, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Citizens in Space, a project of the United States Rocket Academy, has been invited to present at the Fall Meeting of the American Geophysical Union, to be held at the Moscone Center in San Francisco on December 3-7.

"We are pleased for the opportunity to discuss potential collaboration between professional and citizen scientists before such a distinguished audience," said United States Rocket Academy president Edward Wright.

The United States Rocket Academy has acquired a contract for 10 suborbital flights on the XCOR Aerospace Lynx rocketplane, which is expected to begin flight test early next year and enter operational service in 2014. Citizens in Space is making those flights available to the citizen-science community.

"This represents, to the best of our knowledge, the largest single bulk purchase of suborbital flights to date," Wright said. "Citizens in Space will select 100 citizen-science experiments and 10 citizen astronauts to fly as payload operators.

"Professional researchers often wait years for an experiment flight opportunity. Reusable spacecraft such as Lynx are part of a new paradigm for space science, which will allow experimenters to 'fly early, fly often.'

"As one of the first customers for Lynx, Citizens in Space stands at the forefront of this new paradigm. By collaborating with citizen scientists, through Citizens in Space, researchers will be able get small experiments into space faster than ever before.

"Other ways for professional researchers to collaborate with Citizens in Space include data sharing, mentoring, outreach and education, and our $10,000 High Altitude Astrobiology Challenge.

"We look forward to discussing these opportunities with earth- and space-science researchers at this year's Fall Meeting. Researchers can also find information on our website at www.citizensinspace.org."

The American Geophysical Union is a professional organization of earth and space scientists with more than 60,000 members in 148 countries. Approximately 20,000 attend the Fall Meeting each year.

Citizens in Space will present on "Citizen Science and Citizen Space Exploration: Potential for Professional Collaboration" during the session "Exploring Geoscience Frontiers with Low-Cost Access to Space," from 1:40-6:00 PM on December 3.